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Drue

Bias against nocturnal gamers?

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Ok.. let me start out by saying that I'm not *accusing* anybody of anything.. I've just noticed something really bizarre and I'm putting it out for discussion..

 

I'm starting to think there's a bias against nocturnal gamers in EL. Why? Well, let me explain.

 

I'm primarily a harvester/alchemist, and these activities consume probably 85% of my playing time thus far. Today, for example, I spent about 5 hours harvesting silver, another couple hours mixing up FE's, an hour harvesting coal, and an hour or so harvesting diamonds. Then I took a nap.

 

Upon waking, just about two hours ago, I started harvesting diamonds again..

 

The first load, which, for my slightly screwed up build, is 82 diamonds, I broke both pickaxes and had just randomly "stopped harvesting" several time by the time I got to 40 diamonds, and had to go back to storage for more pickaxes.. Since then, every attempt at mining diamonds has had a random stoppage event about every 1-2 minutes.. including one occasion where I hit a teleport nexus before *any* ore was actually harvested.

 

This is about 10x the level of events that I was experiencing before my nap, be it on the silver, the coal, or the diamonds...

 

Now, before anybody starts mentioning Astrology... I have the Skeptic perk.. so technically, Astrology shouldn't *exist* for me.

 

Frankly, I'm at a loss to explain this fluctuation.. That dramatic an increase is something I'm leery of chalking up to "luck".. Especially as it's been confined to a specific time, and over a period of a couple hours.. The only things that pop into my head are "Skeptic doesn't work quite as well as it should".. or "there's some kind of bias in the event code during a given set of hours to deter the "nocturnal afk-harvesters"." I really don't know, but it's kinda weird..

 

Of course, I realize that EL has a playerbase from all over the world... and that "nocturnal" varies by geography.. It's just kinda strange, this Vast increase in events, when the only real difference is the time involved, and that there's a lot less people around....

 

Maybe there's a set range of events, and that gets divided by the number of players in an area? I really don't know..

 

Has anybody else run into this sort of thing? I also find that my likelihood of a harvesting event increases slightly when i switch away from EL to a browser window for a moment, such as when I decide to catch up on my Slashdot reading...

 

Just throwing this out there. Please be gentle. ;)

 

Drue

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Im skeptic and sometimes I can go hours without an event, at other times they seem to happen every 5minutes, just down to luck I suppose ( or skeptic is broken ;) )

Edited by conavar

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First you have to realize that you cannot compare diamonds to any of the other items you harvested. All harvestables have their own event rate and IIRC diamonds are only second to titanium in harvest event rating. The only luck to consider here is the great luck you had during your first round of diamond harvesting. Astrology did not have anything to do with this at all. Skeptic works fine but diamonds can have tons of events just like titanium. No time frame involved just that the lack of events previously finally caught up to you. ;)

 

Tirun

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Well, I also harvest a lot of Titanium... even just comparing between the pre-nap diamonds and the post-nap diamonds.. We're talking a massive level of difference.. so much so that it took me twice as long to harvest the post-nap diamonds, which were about the same amount as the pre-nap.

 

On Titanium, I've noticed an increased amount of pickaxe breakage over other, softer ores.. and that I'm fine with.. it makes sense. But never *anywhere*, since taking Skeptic, have I experienced a run of events like that. It reminds me of one of my pre-skeptic "bad astro" days, to be quite honest.

 

It just strikes me as slightly weird.. I've been playing with Skeptic for around a month now, and it's been one of the best perk purchases I've ever made.. but I've never seen *anything* like this in that month, regardless of what I was harvesting.

 

Musta just been a fluke then.. but it still seems really really odd..

Edited by Drue

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The game is trying to keep u awake????

Edited by time4u2die

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the skeptic perk has astrology affect on you.

 

It basically says that no defenses and penalties of astrology will affect on you. It never says astrology affects you.

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the skeptic perk has astrology affect on you.

 

It basically says that no defenses and penalties of astrology will affect on you. It never says astrology affects you.

 

Huh? :)

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But those ARE the effects of astrology. >.<

 

Skeptic perk excludes you from astrology AND the effects of astrology. :)

 

S.

 

 

this is my take on it, no bonus, no penalty, No effects whats so ever. ( or i think that is what it is supposed to be)

 

qoute from perk descrip.

 

Perk: Skeptic

Cost - Pick Points: 0

Cost - Gold coins: 30000

Description: The astrology does not apply to you. No bonuses, no penalties. !!WARNING!! This perk is permanent, it will NOT be removed by #reset! Cost 0 PP and 30000 gold

Edited by Misery_Machine

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When you have harvested 10K ore during "daytime" and 10K ore during "nighttime" and can show a statistically significant difference, get back to us.

 

Until then, you're sample size is just too small.

 

So, yeah - for now, until proven otherwise - chalk it up to luck. And don't complain - increased harvesting events means there is a greater chance (in a given time) to have a good harvest event like picking up a special stone. Your odds per harvest event remain the same, but you get to "spin the wheel" more often. Perhaps this was actually a boast post (and not a rant)?!

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I'm pretty sure that even before we ever had astrology and skeptic, there were times when MN seemed to have it in for you, and others when you didn't have events for longer periods of time. Plus, as TC says, the thing you harvests makes a difference. I think we just sort of make the assumption that skeptic takes away events. All it does is take away the ability to calculate your own cycle cause ... it's random now :D I guess the "ups and downs" are probably not as high/low either, but this doesn't sound like anything to be concerned about. Sometimes you get three stones in a day, other times nothing for weeks. That's random too :)

 

lilcnoot

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I've had skeptic perk almost since it came out and I the only thing that I have noticed is that you still get cycles on things that astrology affects, such as harving, fails etc but that the time frames tend to be longer and are unpredictable compared to astro.

So eg. instead of having a lot of harv events over the course of a few hours knowing they will be gone by the end of the day as you do with astro, the increased harv events can last for days rather than hours, same with chances of making enriched essies or having fails in mixing.

The skeptic just seems to revert to how things were before astrology and there was always a fluctuation it just isn't predictable with the skeptic perk as it is with astrology.

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it's called luck :)

btw i broke my bronze plate mail in first fight, should i start complainng too ?

 

Lol, I was just checking my breakage logs, and there were VERY few events, like 30 a day or so, and noticed your bronze plate there. You've been very unlucky!

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it's called luck :P

btw i broke my bronze plate mail in first fight, should i start complainng too ?

 

Lol, I was just checking my breakage logs, and there were VERY few events, like 30 a day or so, and noticed your bronze plate there. You've been very unlucky!

tell me something i didn't know :) anyway shit happens

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Hey hey.. not complaining per se... Just thought it was kinda strange, and was curious if anybody else had the same sort of experiences..

 

But it seems it's just the whole "quirks in randomness" thing, so no biggie.

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:P anyway shit happens

 

Nah, dung happens :bow_arrow:

Just could not resist this one :P

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One other thing you may wish to figure into your future observance of harvesting events is that during harvesting times when you receive experience you will get events that arent given outside of that period (after your 120 hits - 240 with exc).

 

Since there is extra events to choose from I have personally wondered if there actually is an increased chance during that period as well but other than casual observance over time I have not really studied it enough to be able to make any conclusion other than that one of Jaclaws above. More than likely the chance of the events is the same regardless, and shit does indeed just happen.

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